A Grim Reality Behind Sandinista Promises

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671 September 13,1988 A GRIM REALITY'BEHIND SANDINISTA PROMISES
INTRODUCTION we cannot continue toleratin those who want to take
advantage of the space the revolution has permitted them With this,
Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega explained why his police on July
10,1988, tear gas s ed, kicked, beat and arrested demonstrators in
the town of Nandaime 36 miles south of Managua? And with this,
Ortega demonstrated that the Sandinista definition of "democracy
has little in common with how the word is used in the United States
e t s In fac t , in the nine years that the Sandinistas have been
in power, they continue to deny the freedoms and democracy
repeatedly promised to the Nicaraguan people. The Sandinistas have
proved that their promises cannot be trusted and that they only
respond to pre s sure from the Nicaraguan Democratic Resistance
also known as the contras. But since Congress cut off U.S. aid to
the Resistance in February, there has been little pressure on the
Sandinistas. Indeed, Sandinista repression has worsened. In the
days followi n g the Nandaime protest, the Sandinista regime closed
down the newspaper La Premu for 15 days and the Catholic Church's
Radio Catolica indefinitely Six prominent opposition 1 aders and 33
demonstrators were jailed and given prison sentences of up to six
mo nths On July 11, the U.S. Ambassador to Nicaragua, Richard
Melton, and seven other embass officials were branded "state
terrorists and ordered to leave the country within 72 hours.

Nicaragua's largest remaining private company, the San Antonio
Sugar Mill, was confiscated by the Sandinista government on July
12,1988 J Democracy still can triumph in Nicaragua. It can do'so,
however, only if the U.S. decides to help the Nicaraguan Resistance
with appropriate and sustained military aid and only if the U.S.
Con g ress stops being fooled by the Sandinistas' empty promises 1
As quoted by Charles Krauthammer in The Washington Post, July
15,1988 2 The Washington limes, July 11,1988 3 The verdict later
was cancelled so they could be tried before a Sandinista judge. The
y now face prison terms of two to six years 4 The Washington Post,
July 12,1988.

A PATTERN OF DECEPTION The Sandinistas have achieved and kept
power by skillfully exploiting the enormous capacity for
self-deception of Western democracies. The Sandinistas h ave
understood perfectly the practical value of making false promises,
starting in 1979 what has become a pattern of deception.

On June 17,1979, when dictator Anastasio Somoza still ruled
Nicaragua, a Sandinista-dominated Junta of the Government of Nation
al Reconstruction (GRN) was formed in Costa Rica to replace him.
Three of the five Junta members were Sandinistas including Daniel
Ortega. The non-Sandinista members were Violeta Chamorro, now
editor of the opposition newspaper La Prensa, and Alfonso Robe l o,
who served for several years as a member of the Nicaraguan
Resistance directorate. One day after being formed, the Junta held
a press conference at which it declared that its plan of government
was truly democratic and that it would respect Nicaraguans '
fundamental liberties, including, among others: freedom of
expression, freedom of religion, and freedom for labor unions, and
that it would establish a mixed economy, a non-aligned foreign
policy, and a minimum permanent military organization OAS 1979 Re s
olution. Less than a week later, on June 23,1979, the Organization
of American States (OAS with U.S. support, adopted a resolution
calling for 1 Immediate and definitive replacement of the Somoza
regime 2) "Installation in Nicaraguan territory of a democr a tic
government, the composition of which should include the principal
representative groups which oppose the Somoza regime and which
reflects the free will of the people of Nicaragua 3) "Guarantee of
the respect for human rights of all Nicaraguans without exception
4) 'The holding of free elections as soon as possible, that will
lead to the establishment of a truly democratic government that
guarantees peace, freedom and justice Formal Pledge of Democracy.
On July 12,1979, five days before the collapse of t he Somoza
regime, the Sandinista-dominated Junta sent a letter to the
Secretary General of the OAS. Attached to the letter were two other
documents: a "Plan to Achieve Peace" and a formal "Program of the
Nicaraguan National Reconstruction Junta These docu m ents
constitute a formal pledge to establish democracy in Nicaragua. The
letter states that the Plan to Achieve Peace was developed "on the
bases of the [June 23, OAS] resolution which "backs the
installation in our country of a broad-based, democratic go v
ernment of the kind we ourselves are establishing e letter also
talks about "Our firm intention to establish respect for human
rights Our decision to enforce civil justice The plan to 5
Organization of American States, Inter-American Commission on Human
R i ghts, "Report on the Situation of Human Rights in the Republic
of Nicaragua OEA/Ser.W/II.53 doc. 25, June 30,1981, p. 3 6 lbid p.
4 2 call Nicaraguans to the first free elections that our country
will have in this centu ry and ends by asking the governmen ts of
the Western Hemisphere to bring democracy and justice to
Nicaragua."

The "Program of the Nicaraguan National Reconstruction Junta"
promised Freedom of publication, information, and expression of
thought Freedom of worship Freedom of Organization by u nions,
trades, and popular movements Annulment of unlawful trials and
judgments Organization of a new national army National police
Independent foreign policy mixed economy and many other fundamental
liberties Promises Violated, One After Another. These p r omises,
later violated one after another helped the Sandinistas achieve
power. Eight years later, under intense military pressure from the
Nicaraguan Resistance, the Sandinistas again made promises. They
apparently were confident that they could still rel y on the
self-deceptive penchant of liberals in the U.S. Congress. On
August, 7,1987, the Sandinistas signed the Central American
Peace.

Agreement, commonly known as the "Arias Peace Plan named after
Costa Rican president Oscar Arias In it, to stay in powe r and to
convince Congress to cut off aid to the Nicaraguan Resistance, the
Sandinistas promised democracy as they did on March 23 1988, in the
truce agreement at the Nicaraguan village of Sapoa. These promises,
like those of 1979, repeatedly have been br o ken BROKEN PROMISES
TO THE ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN STATES The Sandinistas took power
on July 19,1979, and almost immediately started breaking promises
made to the OAS Promise: A broad-based democratic government
Reality: The Sandinistas unilaterally deci d ed in April 1980 to
boost from one-third to two-thirds the number of seats they were
guaranteed in the Council of State, the legislative body that was
supposed to include all forces that fought against Anastasio Somoza
Promise: Full respect for human righ t s Reali The Sandinistas
haveimurdered thousands of political opponents since taking power
Hundreds were killed immediately. The independent Permanent Human
Rights Commission (CPDH) alone documents the disappearances and
likely deaths of 785 persons captur e d by Sandinista authorities
between July 1979 and September 1980.9 In addition 7 Programme of
the Nicaraguan National Reconstruction Government Junta, July
9,1979 8 U.S. Department of State, Human Rights in Nicamgua under
the Sandinktas, December 1986, p. i 9 Humberto Belli,
BreakingFait~(Westchester, Ill Crossway Books, 1989, p. 120 3
according to CPDH, tens of thousands of peasants have been forcibly
relocated to encampments. Today, Nicaragua has at least 8,200
political prisoners; many of them are tortu r ed in jail Promise:
Free elections Reality: The June 23,1979, Organization of American
States resolution called for, and the Sandinistas promised, free
elections. Since coming to power, the Sandinistas have made it
clear that they have no intention of all o wing free elections
involving all major political parties in Nicaragua. Said Interior
Minister Tomas Borge: "We are not going to lose at the polls what
we have won through arms." Said top Sandinista party member Rafael
Solis Elections in Nicaragua will no t be for the purpose of
disputing power, but to fortify the revolution As for the
well-publicized 1984 elections, the leftist French news a er Le
Monk reported that they do not deserve to be dignified by the name"
electionsfrZPIn a letter to Ortega, Carlos Andres Perez, the former
Venezuelan president, a leader of the Socialist International, and
early Sandinista supporter wrote Those of us who believe we have
done so much for the Sandinista Revolution feel cheated, because
sufficien guarantees were not pro v ided to assure the
participation of all political forces joined in his condemnation of
the "elections" by most Latin American heads of state. The
Sandinistas even have admitted the validity of this criticism.
Comandante Bayardo Arce, a top Sandinista part y director, said
that the 1984 elections were a stratagem to "disarm the
international bourgeoisie and were to reinforce a one-party
state.14 4 Perez was Promise: Trial by the civil courts in
accordance with the pre-revolutionary laws for members of the So m
oza regime accused of crimes against the Nicaraguan people Reality:
The Sandinistas instead created "Special Courts In August 1980, the
United Nations International Commission of Jurists concluded: "An
impartial observer must reach the conclusion that the Special
Courts constitute exceptional tribunals handing down purely
political justice."15 An extraordinarily high share, 78 percent, of
the 6,000 tried by the Special Courts" were convicted.and received
sentences of up to 30 years imprisonment.

The Specia l Courts began operation in November 1979, were
dissolved in February 1981 but were revived in early 1983 as the
Popular Anti-Somocista Tribunals (TPAs) allegedly to deal with the
growing number of accused lfcounterrevolutionaries Like the Special
Courts 1 0 The Nicaraguan Permanent Commission on Human Rights, in
its June 1988 report Human Rights in Nicaragua: A Summary During
the Peace Process estimates that Sandinista jails hold no fewer
than 6,200 prisoners accused of being "counterrevolutionaries" and
s o me 2,,ooO accused of having belonged to the Somoza National
Guard. 11 Quoted in "The Meaning and Destiny of the Sandinista
Revolution Policy Fomm, August 1987, pp. 7-8 12 Quoted in Belli,
op. cit p. 69 13 &id 14 Secretaria de Estado de 10s Estados
Unidos D iscurso Secret0 del Comandante Bayardo Arce ante el
Partido Socialista Nicaraguense (PSN Publicacion 9422, Serie
Interamericana 118, March 1985 15 Belli, op. cif p. 125 4 the TPAs
operated outside the legal system until they were abolished in
January 1988 Sentences imposed by the TPAs'were not subject to
appeal or review. TPAs were severely criticized by many
international organizations including the Organization of American
States and the United Nations Promise: Freedom of expression
Reality: Within weeks after taking power, the Sandinistas took
control of one of Nicaragua's two daily newspapers, all teledsion
stations, and most of the radio stations. The newspaper was
converted into the official Sandinista newspaper, called uricada.
The television station s became the Sandinista party-owned
"Sandinista Television System The other newspaper La Bema, while
not confiscated, was censored by a Sandinista-controlled union,
then closed, and then erratically allowed to reopen Promise:
Freedom of religion Reality: T h e Nicaraguan Catholic Bishops
welcomed the overthrow ofSomoza in 1979 and no bishop criticized
the Sandinistas for over a year, despite repeated Sandinista
attempts to politicize religion and compel Christians to join
organizations of the Sandinista Natio n al Front of Liberation
(FSLN the Sandinista party. In October 1980, however, the Catholic
hierarchy published a document expressing its reservations about
the Sandinistas intentions. This triggered a Sandinista campaign of
verbal attacks against the bisho p s. They were accused of being
enemies of the people and counterrevolutionaries, and of
representing "the Church of the rich On July 7,1981, the government
suspended the televised mass that the archbishop of Managua, Miguel
Obando y Bravo, had celebrated f o r many years. Several Moravian
missionaries, meanwhile, were imprisoned and several others were
killed by the Sandinistas. The Catholic Bishop Pablo Antonio Vega
was attacked and stoned by a Sandinista mob. Continuing their
campaign to discredit the Catho l ic Church, in August 1982, the
Sandinistas forced Father Bismarck Carballo, a leading Catholic
Church spokesman and director of Radio Catolica, to walk naked in
front of TV c,meramen and a Sandinista mob. l6 Promise: Free labor
unions Reality: In 1979 the Sandinistas created their own labor
unions: the Sandinista I Confederation of Labor (CST) for urban
workers and the Association of Agricultural Workers (ATC The
following year, the CST joined the World Federation of Trade
Unions, the Marxist organization. h eadquartered in Prague.
Independent labor unions, such as the Nicaraguan Confederation of
Labor (a) and the Council of Trade Unification CUS which maintains
links to the U.S. AFLCIO, are branded counterrevolutionary and
instruments of "U.S. imperialism Sa ndinista troops shot up the
CIWs Managua 16 &id, p. 198 5 headquarters in December 19

79. CI'N's General Secretary, Carlos Huembes, was beaten by
Sandinistas at Managua airport in February 1981 and his house
vandalized. The San dinistas banned all labor strikes in September
1981 Promise: A nonaligned foreign policy Reality: Cuban advisors
arrived in Nicaragua exactly when the Sandinistas took control of
Managua on July 19,19

79. By that November, there were approximately 200 Cub an
advisors in Nicaragua. The following year, an additional 4,000
Cubans came to Nicaragua as teachers, physicians, and health
workers. The Cubans were joined by "advisors" from the Soviet
Union, Bulgaria, and East Germany.

Daniel Ortega delivered a speec h in Havana in September 1979
outlining Sandinista foreign poli uncritical support of the Soviet
Union and its allies and unflagging criticism of the U.S. He
expressed his support for Marxist movements around the world and
demanded the withdrawal of U.S. t roops from South Korea. In 1980,
when the U.S. was still the main source of financial assistance to
Nicaragua, the Sandinistas signed a series of
government-to-government agreements with the Soviet Union on
economic, technical scientific, and cultural mat t ers. Reportedly,
they also signed a mutual support agreement between the Sandinista
party (FSLN) and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.18 The
treaty fully endorses all major tenets of Soviet foreign policy
while condemning the U.S. At the United Nat i ons, the Sandinistas
abstained from condemning the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and
the Soviet attack on Korean Airlines flight 007'in 1982 lV Promise:
A mixed economy Reality: The week they came to power, the
Sandinistas nationalized the banking system and foreign trade
companies. The state-owned banking system immediately began to
discriminate against the private sector by charging higher interest
rates on loans to private enterprises and by cutting back on bank
credits. The nationalization of foreign t rade meant that producers
of such major export products as coffee, cotton, and sugar would
have to sell their products to the government, the only existing
buyer. The result: coffee production has plummetted from 140
million pounds in 1979 to 80 million p o unds in 1986; and cotton
production in the same period dropped from 500,000 bales to
2OO,OOO.l9 While Nicaragua's total exports in 1978 were $646
million, by 1986 they were only $218 million.20 17 Speech before
the plenary session of the Sixth Summit Conf e rence of Nonaligned
Countries, Havana, Cuba September 3,19l!l 18 Nina M. Serafino
Nicaragua: A Selected Chronology of the Sandinista Revolution July
17,1979 to December 31,1983 Library of Congress, Congressional
Research Service, March 20,1984 19 Speech b y Enrique Bolanos,
president of the Nicaraguan Supreme Council of Private Enterprise
(COSEP before the Nicaraguan-American Bankers Association, Miami,
September 15,19

87. Diu& La Americm September 20,1987 ml'bid 6 At first,
confiscation of private property for the most part was limited to
the holdings of the Somoza family and its close friends and
associates. Later, the property of many anti-Somozist Nicaraguans
was confiscated. In their effort to monopolize control of the
nation's food, the Sandinistas cr e ated the Nicaraguan Institution
for Basic Foods ENABAS which intended to function as the sole
official broker between farmers and consumers. Farmers refused to
deal with buyers from ENABAS, who on occasions would be accompanied
by Sandinista military to f o rce peasants to sell to them. ENABAS
has used food as a weapon, distributing scarce supplies on the
basis of political allegiance so that Sandinistas ate first. Ration
cards at times have been denied to those who have criticized the
Sandinista regime THE A RIAS PEACE PLAN AND SAPOA NEW PROMISES
Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega joined the presidents of Central
America in Guatemala City on August 7,1987 for the signing of a
democratization plan known as "Arias Peace Plan It commits the
signatories' to settle i nternal conflicts and make democratic
reforms.

The provisions of the plan were to be in place by November
5,1987, and the Central American presidents were to review
compliance the following January. Key elements of the plan include:
dialogue with all unarm ed internal political opposition; amnesty
for political opponents; cease-fire with local insurgent groups;
democratization, including respect for human rights, complete
freedom of press, radio and television, rights of political parties
to have full acces s to the media, to associate, and to
proselytize; termination of outside assistance and safe havens
provided to irregular forces; negotiations to limit regional
militarization under the Contadora Act for Peace and Cooperation in
Central America.

The Sandin istas virtually ignored the November 1987 deadline
for complying with the provisions of the Arias Peace Plan, limitin
their actions to the October reopening of the newspaper La Prema
and Radio Catolica. In January 1988, Ortega proposed extending the
deadl i ne for complying with the plan. The democratic presidents
of Central America refused and demanded immediate compliance 5 This
demand, coupled with the possibility of renewed U.S. aid to the
Nicaraguan Resistance, prompted Ortega to announced that Nicaragu a
would lift the five-and-a-half-year-old state of emergency, abolish
the political tribunals, begin direct talks with the Resistance,
and grant conditional amnesty to political prisoners. Ortega's
announcement obscured Sandinista noncompliance with the Ar i as
Peace Plan, fueled new expectations for democracy, and gave the
U.S. Congress the rationale to terminate aid to the Nicaraguan
Resistance, which it did on February 3,1988 21 The Sandinistas shut
down La Prensu on June 26,1988, and Radio Catolica on Jan u ary
1,1986 7 Promise: Dialogue Gth all unarmed internal political
opposition Reality: The Sandinistas and the internal civic
opposition, composed of several political parties, labor unions,
and the private sector, opened a dialogue on October 5,1987, in a c
cordance with the Arias Peace Plan. On November 26, opposition
party representatives presented a 17-point constitutional reform
proposal. The Sandinistas refused to address the civic opposition
key proposal calling for an end to Sandinista control over th e
army and police. By April 26, after 24 sessions, the Sandinistas
had not considered seriously any of the 17 constitutional reforms.
To date, the situation remains unchanged. However, they did score
important international propaganda points, especially in Western
Europe, by "talking with the internal civic opposition Promise:
Amnesty for political opponents Reality: Since the signing of the
Arias Peace Plan the Sandinistas have released 16 foreign and more
than 1,000 domestic prisoners. Yet, according to t h e independent
Nicaraguan Permanent Commission on Human Rights (CPDH) at least
8,200 political prisoners remain in Sandinista jails. Many of those
released, moreover, have complained of being harassed and
threatened by the Sandinista security police.22 The Sandinistas
have refused to grant Miguel Cardinal Obando y Bravo, President of
the Commission for National Reconciliation, his request for an
official list of political prisoners. And the Sandinistas have
stated that prisoners would only be released after the Nicaraguan
Resistance surrendered its weapons Promise: Work toward a
cease-fire Reality: The Sandinistas have reneged on their promise
to sign an enclave agreement.

This would establish territorial zones that the Resistance
troops would occupy during the truce. The Sandinista refusal to
establish enclaves has prevented the Resistance from receiving in
Nicaragua the humanitarian assistance approved by Congress on March
30th of this year, thus forcing the Resistance to retreat to
neighboring countries, and has given the Sandinistas an excuse for
not freeing more political prisoners.

Despite talk of cease-fire, on May 18,1988, Ortega promised to
"annihilate" the resistance if negotiations failed to produce a
cease-fire. In the last round of talks between the Sandinistas and
the Resistance, held in Managua in June 719,1988, Defense Minister
Humberto Ortega reportedly threatened to kill the resistance
representatives present in the room 22 The CPDH reports that a
former member of the Nicaraguan Resistance, E fren Mondragon, was
killed by Sandinista State Security Agents after accepting amnesty.
June 1988 report, op. cit 8 Promise: Democracy, including respect
for human rights, complete freedom of expression, full access to
the media for all political parties, and freedom of association
Reality: Reports the Nicaraguan Permanent Human Rights Commission
earlier this summer: "Within Nicaragua laws violating human rights,
as well as actions by both the military authorities and the turbas
[Sandinista mobs have been u sed to close the few political spaces
that were opened. These actions are directed against citizens who
in an attempt to exercise their rights dare to dissent from the
politics of the Sandinista Party."23 Turbas have been used to
terrorize the opposition. On January 22, they attacked the offices
of the Nicaraguan Democratic Coordinator (a broad umbrella
organization of opposition groups) and the "January 22 Mothers of
Political Prisoners Movement peaceful demonstration. Sandinista
police did nothing to sto p the attacks. Press censorship has
become common despite repeated Sandinista promises for
"unrestricted freedom of the press" contained in both the Arias
Peace Plan and the Sapoa agreements. Nicaragua's Law of Means of
Communications allows the Sandinista s to close, temporarily or
indefinitely any media outlet. Executive decrees prohibit the
dissemination by the media of information related to military
action or food prices unless such information has first been
'lconfirmed'l or cleared by the Sandinista g o vernment. Since they
signed the Arias Peace Plan the Sandinistas have 1) closed, on July
11,1988, the newspaper La Prema for 15 days and Radio Catolica
indefinitely; 2) used the Law of Means of Communications on several
occasions to shut down news program s on Radio Corporacion, Radio
Mundial, and Radio Noticias; 3 withheld newsprint from La Prema;24
and 4) refused to allow independent TV stations to begin
broadcasting Promise: End to assistance and safe havens for
guerrilla forces Reality: A former top Def e nse Ministry official
who defected to the U.S. last October Major Roger Miranda
Bengoechea, revealed that as recently as October 1987, Nicaragua
was training Salvadoran guerrillas in the use of surface-to-air
missiles Promise: Negotiations to limit region al militarization
under the Contadora Plan for Peace and Cooperation in Central
America Reality: Nicaragua's military build-up continues to
threaten Central American stability.

Since signing the Arias Peace Plan, the Sandinistas have
received some 7,300 me tric tons of military hardware from the
Soviet Union and its allies. Last December Major Roger Miranda
Bengoechea discovered Sandinista plans to continue Nicaragua's
military build-up, including increasing the size of the armed
forces and reserves to 590, 000 and upgrading the air force with
Soviet Mig-21 jet fighters by 19

95. Defense Minister Ortega brashly announced a strategy to irm
600,000 Nicaraguans in Ithe national defensive system Instances of
forced conscription of young Nicaraguans into the Sandi nista Army
have 23 Bid 24 The Sandinista government is the only supplier of
newsprint. Official newspapers, such as the Sandinistas Banicada,
always have plenty of newsprint 9 increased after the signing of
the Arias Peace Plan and further escalated since the Sapoa
agreements. The day after the Sapoa signing, for example,
Sandinista military patrols conducted pre-dawn arm recruiting raids
on homes in Managua and other cities, forcibly conscripting young
men A CONCLUSION To achieve power, the Sandinistas in 1979 promised
the Organization of American States that they would establish a
democratic government in Nicaragua. They did not keep their
promise. Eight years later, when they felt threatened in the
battlefield by the Nicaraguan Resistance, they made new prornises
by signing the Arias Peace Plan. Again, they have not kept their
word.

The Sandinistas have demonstrated that they have no intention of
establishing democracy in Nicaragua or to respect the sovereignty
of their neighbors. Concessions that they ha ve made in the past
have been forced by the military pressure of the democratic
Resistance.

When this pressure lifts, the Sandinistas become more violent
and oppressive. Only military pressure from the Nicaraguan
Resistance can force the Sandinistas to ke ep the promises that
they have made to the Nicaraguan people and to the Western
hemisphere. The U.S can force the Sandinistas to keep their
promises by providing military aid to the Nicaraguan
Resistance.